Impulse

I just made an impulse buy on Etsy. I can’t wait for it to come in the mail! In reality, it’s been in the back of my mind for a couple of years now to find and buy this item.

As I mentioned in an earlier blog, I started sewing at the young age of about four. My mother was a seamstress and started me hand sewing early on. As my sisters and I got older, we learned to make clothes on her wonderful old Singer. But one of the best gifts I ever received was from my grandmother for my high school graduation. She gave me a brand new 1973 Singer Genie!

Vintage Singer Genie. Don’t you just love the mod flowers? So ’70’s!

It’s a cute little machine complete with 1970’s mod flowers on its faceplate and it’s own slide-on case that also happens to hold the power cord and presser foot. Off it went to college where my sewing impulse could be fed whenever it hit. I loved that little machine.

It made clothes and mended nicely, but more importantly it helped me sew the first quilt I ever made. That quilt went to a guy I had just met who became the love of my life and future husband. I could never have predicted that the impulse to make him a quilt would also lead to a lifetime of quilting.

The first quilt I made with my Singer Genie

Although a very basic machine, it was able to tackle the teeny tiny miniature quilts I fell in love with in the 80’s and still make to this day. It had its quirks but we played well together and boy did it get a workout. It made quite a number of the mini quilts in my first published book, Small Talk, as well as all my teaching samples and quilts for my family.

My first published book, Small Talk

Alas, when I bought my first Bernina in 1987, on impulse I gave my Genie to my sister so she had something to use for mending. She doesn’t sew at all and I don’t know what happened to that little machine with the passage of time.

Fast forward to a few years ago. Quilting buddy, Barb Eikmeier, and I decided to put together a lecture on the past four decades of quilting and all the humongous changes that have taken place in that span of time. While we were preparing our outline and collecting our artifacts I discovered she had started out on the same model Singer Genie as I—and she still had hers!!! Wow!!!

Barb’s Singer Genie displayed for our lecture.

That’s when the niggle of a thought entered my mind that, hmmmm, maybe I needed to find another Genie for myself. It’s just so darn cute! And…….it was so instrumental in the start of my lifelong passion and career in the world of quilting. So, yes, I would have to find one. Someday. And then the thought melted away only to resurface for a moment or two from time to time.

Then this morning I decided on impulse to search for a Singer Genie to buy! I don’t know why it popped into my brain but I went online and found that what was new and sparkly to me once upon a time is now called ‘vintage’. Does that make me vintage too? Oh well, so be it.

There were a few available, all in different degrees of condition, and all claiming to still run well. I studied photos and reread descriptions and wondered and pondered and finally, just did it! Impulse buy!

Now I feel like a kid waiting for Christmas and hoping my impulse buy was worth it! I’ll report later on how she sews but I can’t wait to have a new/old Singer Genie back in my world of sewing.

I may have to try her out on one of my new mini quilts……………. Just for old times sake you know.

Really cute machine. Larry bought me a singer golden touch and sew dressmaker machine in 1966 and I still have it. Don’t use it that much, but just couldn’t trade it in when I got my Pfaff in 1990. With the built in walking foot, it is good for bindings and has many nice features. But I am stuck in the early years with my featherweight machines and 301 singers. I use them the most for piecing. From my grandmother’s treadle machine, thru my mother’s new Kenmore bought at Sears when I was in junior high and a universal machine given to me in 1964, I have always had a machine. Now that I think back on those machines, I feel very lucky. Really enjoy you sharing your life.

It’s amazing how treasured the old machines are. They were made so well back then. Like you I can’t even begin to imagine not having a sewing machine. I’d want a treadle if I ever had to live without electricity. Although I enjoy hand piecing as well, I wouldn’t want to have sew everything by hand!

I still have mine–it just like this, except mine was made in Europe, and has a voltage switch underneath. Mine is called a Starlet, and I wouldn’t give it up for anything, though I do most of my sewing on a Bernina now. Starlet made many clothes, and my first quilts.

I hadn’t realized some were made in France until I went on a search for one the other day. My Genie like your Starlet was a good little workhorse. I’m looking forward to having one again. I just hope she works well.